Rory McIlroy: Is Rory Losing His Popularity Among Millennials?
By Matt Cochran
Jordan Spieth and Rickie Fowler crack a Top 40 list of Millennials’ favorite athletes while Rory McIlroy falls short. Has McIlroy lost his popularity?
It’s hard for athletes to stay relevant in today’s society with how quickly everyone’s attention changes from one thing to the next. If you aren’t staying in the headlines every week then people are going to start forgetting about you and jumping to the next best thing. Rory McIlroy is learning this the hard way.
120 Sports teamed up with Ranker.com to release the second edition of their “Millennials’ Athlete Index.” The Millennials’ Athlete Index is a year long poll voted on by Millennials to determine their 40 favorite athletes.
The athletes that fall in the Top 40 are determined by the number of votes an athlete receives from Millennials through the course of the year as well as the athlete’s presence on social media. Over 1,400 18-34-year-olds were polled to determine those names most relevant to them.
To get an understanding of who made the Index, here is a look at the top names on the list:
- Stephen Curry, 27, NBA
- J.J. Watt, 26, NFL
- Mike Trout, 24, MLB
- Alex Morgan, 26, USWNT
- Cam Newton, 26, NFL
Believe it or not, it seems that there is some appreciation for golfers among the Millennials, although it may not make very much sense to golf fans.
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Jordan Spieth and Rickie Fowler both made the Top 40 with Spieth coming in at No. 17 and Fowler at No. 35. In 2014, Fowler was all the way up at No. 23, while Bubba Watson came in at No. 33 and Tiger Woods barely made it at No. 40. You may notice that Jason Day falls short of this list as does Rory McIlroy.
It’s not so surprising that Day isn’t on the list. He’s not the flashiest player on the TOUR, he just goes out there and takes care of business. I don’t expect Millennials to appreciate Day based solely on his golfing ability. However, it does surprise me that McIlroy falls short of this list.
A bunch of people must have jumped off the McIlroy bandwagon after he ruptured his ankle ligament playing soccer with friends. He was forced to miss six months of golf which included his title defense at The Open Championship. It wasn’t too long ago that the Ulsterman won three times in a row, including back-to-back majors. How quickly we forget.
Maybe his layoff had something to do with it or maybe it’s his lack of social media presence. The Index does take into account how active an athlete is on social media. Rory doesn’t take to Instagram or Twitter as much as Fowler and Spieth, but I wouldn’t say he’s too far off.
So why is it that McIlroy, a Millennial himself, falls short of making a list of Millennials’ favorite athletes? Is he just not active enough on the Twittersphere or has he just lost his popularity?
My only explanation for this is the immediate gratification society that we live in. If there is anything we know about Millennials, it’s that they can’t stay focused on one thing for more than five minutes at a time. We are the ultimate ADD generation.
Rory McIlroy has fallen out of the limelight recovering from injury while Spieth and Fowler have risen to the top. Like Janet Jackson once said, “What have you done for me lately?”
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Until Rory McIlroy gets back in the winner’s circle, he’ll continue to be overlooked by the popularity of others. I’m not saying that McIlroy has lost his popularity all together, but outside of the golfing community that seems to be the case.